Must Be Tuesday
by SniperCT
Summary: It's not easy being Headmistress of a school for Mutants. Reactors explode, kids get hurt and supervillains attack regularly. Might as well paint a target on the roof, it's Tuesday again. Add to that an unspoken attraction to your best friend and things just get complicated. This is set in kind of a floating time during Kitty's tenure as Headmistress to avoid tripping over canon.


**AN: Pretty much going to be AU, but it's the X-men. AUs are like candy. They'll probably even visit one. I'm a big fan of the Exiles ;)**

* * *

I can tell Rach is at the door just by the tug at the back of my mind. Her presence in my head is comforting. She's not there on purpose, not intruding, but a long time ago a link between our minds was established and I'd probably lose myself if that warmth ever disappeared. We haven't exactly been talking as much as we used to. It scares me a little.

We drift apart sometimes but we always come back together. I sometimes feel like I'm the only thing keeping Rachel here. Like without me she'd just run off somewhere. That's probably selfish and a little conceited but I've been in her head and she's been in mine. Maybe no one knows me better. I like to think no one knows her better than me.

The whiskey burns at my throat when I knock the glass back. The red-head plops down onto my desk, taking the bottle and drinking from it. "Logan still hide these in the grandfather clocks?"

"Yep."

"You okay?"

"Yep." I'm lying and I know she knows it. I don't let telepaths in, except Rachel, not if I can help it. She can see past that mask that I wear to try to pretend everything is okay. She can peel me apart like an onion, see through all of my layers down to the angry and bitter core that bubbles away deep inside me. The roiling emotions there have built up over time with no real release. Too many years of watching family and loved ones suffer, of having to - at times - choose to do some horrible things, just for a better future..

That's the problem with being an X-man. There's no stopping, no slowing down, just one train-wreck after another. A day off every once in awhile isn't really enough, not when no one ever sat us down and told us 'this is how you deal.' I've been angry since ... well since I let myself get pulled back out of college. Sometimes I think I can understand the way Rachel feels, having no control over her life.

But I'm happier here than I've been in a long time. Running the school, making a difference in these kids' lives. I feel her across our mental link. It's never broken, though it's frayed at times. I let her in, in a way no one else is allowed to.

Our eyes meet and I tell her, _I'm really okay._

_You're not,_ she replies to me. The sound of her mental voice is warm and comforting. More than that but I never let myself think about that. _You can talk to me. About anything._

Almost anything. I never told her about Xi'an, for example. How we'd almost kissed in the rubble of that building. I didn't know how she'd react. I didn't even understand my own reaction to that. Or the dreams I sometimes have. Waking up with my skin flushed and wishing someone else was in my bed.

Rachel tips back the bottle for another drink, before I take it to give myself a little more. Our hands touch and my stomach does something weird. I can blame the whiskey, but part of me doesn't want to..

"I fucked up, Rach." I swivel back and forth in my leather chair. "Should have remembered what setting up something like that could do. The dangers involved."

"You know this place has a target painted on the roof. This kind of thing is going to happen again and again." She kicks her legs a bit, looking down into the bottle. I can't read her expression. It's a little sad and a little morose. "Guess we should be used to that by now. I don't think it was an attack, though."

I get up and lean over her, nudging her forehead with my own. I don't like this expression on her face. I want to make it go away. "Yeah. Just kind of hoped it would be different this time. If it's not the Brotherhood, it's something else entirely. I've got a running bet with Bobby on the next alien invasion. Always some kind of struggle."

Something passes in her eyes but it's gone before I can figure out what it is. _It's **always** going to be a struggle, Kitty._ She's so tense. While I bury everything deep, she can't. She's too much like her mother, and her emotions are like a storm beneath her skin. Or maybe she's just as tired of the bullshit as I am. Just as angry.

"I just wish that..." Her hands rest on my hips, as though she can't decide if she needs to push me away or pull me closer. I'm close enough that I can taste her breath and it does something unexpected to me. It makes my head feel foggy, and makes me _want_. These inappropriate, unwelcome thoughts swim around until they're a cacophony.

"Wish what?" Rachel sounds breathless. Her fingers dig into the skin between my skirt and my shirt.

_That we didn't have to struggle. Let ourselves feel the things we feel and be the people we want to be._ It made more sense to me before I 'said' it to her.

Her response hits me like a knife to the chest. _When did we **ever** know what those things **were?**_

There's almost no distance between us and she hesitates. The last time I was this close to another girl's lips, they had belonged to Xi'an. At the time, I'd told myself it was the adrenaline. I hadn't wanted to face that part of myself, and I'm not sure I want to face it now. But I can't get the thought of what she'd taste like out of my head.

"Kitty, you're.."

"I'm not as drunk as you think I am." My own voice sounds distant to my ears as I lean in. Our lips almost brush, before she pushes me away with her powers, and I flop into my leather chair.

"Yes you are."

Rachel doesn't give me a chance to protest before she's out of the office. I feel our bond weaken until she's too far away to pick up. I sink down into the leather and squeeze back tears. "Oh god what did I just do?"

Rachel had taken the bottle, so I finish my glass and set it down, burying my head in my hands and letting myself have a good old fashioned freak out.

"Hey darlin'." A gruff voice startles me out of it and I pretend I'd just been concentrating on something outside on the grounds.

"Logan! What's up?"

"Jus' makin' sure you're doin' okay," the man says. He has a way of looking at me that makes it impossible to hide anything from him. Even if he couldn't sniff you out he'd still know. He looks extra grumpy today. Considering there's a hole the size of a warship in our science lab, I don't blame him.

"Yeah, I'm doing fine." I put a grin on my face for him, and tug my hair back into a pony-tail, before wiping my eyes and face. I guess it's time to put on the headmistress mask again. I'm not really looking forward to it. Or trying to explain to Bobby why I almost kissed my best friend.

You know what? I'm so not explaining that to Bobby. Besides, the way he looks at some of his exes makes me want to smack him. I guess that makes me a hypocrite.

"Sure you are. That's why you hit up my secret stash." His grin is toothy and he doesn't seem that ticked off. Which is good, because being on his bad side can ruin your week.

"Your stash isn't that secret. You've been hiding that stuff in the clocks since I was still in ballet shoes."

"I've got some new hidin' places," he retorts, following me out of my office. I wobble a bit as I walk, but contrary to Rachel's belief, I'd only had a glass and a half. I'm not _that_ much a lightweight. I hang around Logan and when one of your first boyfriends was Pete Wisdom you develop some tolerance. For bullshit as well as for alcohol, at any rate.

I still talk to Wisdom. Things'll never be the same with us, but we're at least friends again. I already know he'll make some comment about the body condom brigade and every street corner being on fire, so I probably won't mention this next time I speak to him.

"Lets see." I walk past some plants and pull out some tequila, handing it over to him. "You're getting predictable, old man."

He sniffs it. "That ain't mine."

"Then someone is going to be a very sad panda when they check their stash." I snatch it back and decide to claim it for myself.

Back in the science lab, it's still a mess. I can hear Hank digging around trying to take stock of the damage, and let Logan go speak with him. I walk over to the epicenter. There's a huge black spot where the incident had happened. We still don't know for sure if it was an attack or if it was just an accident, but several of the kids had been hurt and I feel responsible. The reactor had been my idea. It had been such a fun part of my college experience (minus the Sentinels) that I wanted the students to experience it too. (minus the Sentinels)

"Any idea what happened?" I ask, turning to Hank as the blue, furry man approached.

"I'm afraid I'm still looking into that. When the reactor reached critical mass, there was excessive internal pressure, which caused the structure to expand and fail."

"So it exploded," Logan said, stepping up to my other side.

"In layman's terms, yes."

"And no idea why?" I fold my arms, and wish I'd thought to pop a mint. Or drink a little less because sometimes I can be an idiot.

There's a flash of light and I'm ripped off my feet. I scream as I hurtle through the air, slamming into something hard and unyeilding.

My ears are ringing as I pick myself up off the ground. Disoriented, I try to get my bearings but my eyes just won't focus. What now? I mean seriously, what now? Can we have just _one_ crisis at a time?

Everything snaps back into place. Logan is flat on the ground nearby and Hank is messing with some piece of machinery. There's some kind of orb of light in the center of the room. It undulated and wobbles like the pulsing of a heart. I start to drag Logan away from whatever it is. "Hank! What the hell just happened!"

"I am still trying to decipher the data streaming out of that breach." I hop up to join him. There's so much information on the display that it bleeds together. Focusing on the most obvious, I point at a line. "Look at the size of that spike. "

"Yes, that was the burst a few moments ago." He points one furry finger and traces the curve. "There's your spike, across every spectrum."

I look over at the light, then back at the display. Curiosity overwhelms me, but that has to take a back seat to keeping my students safe. "I feel like I've seen this signature before, but we've got to shut this thing _down_, Hank."

"It does look familiar, Kitty." Hank pushes his glasses up on his face and then I can literally see the lightbulb above his head. "Oh my stars and garters." His fingers dance across the keyboard and swipe at the display. He overlays another reading on what's coming out of the light.

"Son of a _bitch_." The signature of our little rift is a twin to the signature of the background radiation of the universe.

Hank glances at me. "Congratulations, we've given birth to a new universe."

"I think I need to sit down." Logan's still out of it so I just plop down onto his chest and plant my forehead into my palm. "Okay, we can handle this. We just need to contain it before it grows much further and starts to develop some kind of life. Is it expanding? What about magnetic containment?"

"I'm going to need a much larger power source," Hank replies. "It's expanding at a rate of one micrometer per second."

I run the math in my head. "So we're looking at it growing at about a meter in a week and a half?"

"Less. It's also accelerating."

Of course it is. My chairs shifts underneath me and I bounce to my feet in case he wakes up violently. Being Logan's scratching post would be about how I'm expecting today to end, but I doubt it can get much worse.

Grunting, Logan sits up and looks around. "The fuck happened?"

I wave my hand in the general direction of our baby universe. "We're parents."

He looks at the orb of light, then back at me. "Next time wake me up for the fun part."

Instead of reaching to help him up I smack him upside the head. Not many people can get away with that with Wolverine and live, but hey, I'm special. He grunts again and this time I help him up. "The bad news is it's expanding. The good news is it's expanding slowly. Hank's working on that."

McCoy looks up from his readouts and tries to give us a reassuring smile. Logan rubs his hand over his face. "I'll have this area quarantined an' then we'll figure out if we need to evac the kids."

Hank returns to his work and Logan jogs out of the lab. I stand there for a moment, feeling a little like a fifth wheel. On top of that I really need an aspirin. "Let me know if anything changes."

"Will do."


End file.
